Scottish government publishes report on national arts companies

Scotland's five national performance companies achieved audiences of more than a million on a combined turnover of Â£70.3 million in the last two years, according to a Scottish Government report published this week.

The report details the income, performance levels and education outcomes for the National Theatre of Scotland, Scottish Ballet, Scottish Opera and the two national orchestras the RSNO and the SCO in the two years after moving to direct funding from the Scottish Government in April 2007.

Commenting on the impact of the recession, the report notes that "none of the companies experienced a significant reduction in earned income that could be directly attributable to the economic downturn during 2008/9, although some companies lost long-standing support from charitable trusts and foundations and from individual donors.

"All experienced difficulty in getting commercial organisations to commit to future sponsorships and it remains to be seen how this will affect future income generation."

The report shows that the companies expenditure on productions and performances rose by Â£2 million over the two years to Â£25.8 million, which runs at 72% of turnover. Staff salaries fell by a percentage point to 5%, while marketing, sponsorship and fund-raising spend was at 9% of turnover.

At Â£13 million, the combined total of box office income was 18.6% of total income over the two years. Income from commercial sponsorship and fund-raising remained at 9% of income. The vast majority of income, 77%, comes from government grants.

The NTS provided the largest share of the total audience, with 1,068 performances of 30 productions playing to 319,197 people.